


Letters to Death

by pansypxrkinson



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: A heavy dollop of astronomy, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, BC i am Weak and hate sad endings, Canon Compliant, Dark, Epistolary, Fluff and Angst, HP: EWE, Hogwarts Eighth Year, Hogwarts Era, Hold onto your horses guys, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Lots of patronus-ing, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Not Epilogue Compliant, Protective Draco, Suicidal Themes, draco plays piano, in parts, this is gonna be a heavy one
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-10-14
Updated: 2018-03-03
Packaged: 2019-01-17 11:29:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 19,075
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12364794
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pansypxrkinson/pseuds/pansypxrkinson
Summary: He's never noticed before, but Harry Potter walks as if the world is ablaze behind him.And this would be all well and good... If he were not walking towards Draco.Looking like he had that day when he'd saved him from a fiery death.Looking like a god.Hades in the flesh.Draco thinks to himself that Potter must in fact be so, because he's moving towards Draco with such an incongruous look, that it's making his head spin...Making him dizzy, and inciting the same bitter smoke heavy and cloying in his throat as if Potter had instead kicked him from his firebolt that day, and left Draco to burn into the blackened carpet.





	1. Hydra

**Author's Note:**

> So. This has been my baby. 
> 
> Hard as I tried I just couldn't shake off the temptation to write this.  
> It's going to be a long one, and a dark one at that. Filled with all the not-so-breezy questions and headcanons I still have concerning the HP universe.  
> It was a suuper challenge to write, so apologies if the writing is kinda clumsy at times, and I have a ways to go, although I have the skeleton of the story planned out!
> 
> Hope you guys enjoy! Feedback is always appreciated, and goes a long way as to my completing my writing <3 
> 
> Please do heed the warnings. This one is pretty dark (although i hate sad endings, so do not fear). And if it's not for you, I have a sequel to my previous drarry drabble in the works soon...
> 
> PP x

"You care so much you feel as though you will bleed to death with the pain of it"  
-

Harry liked the rain.

The soft drumming of water against his skin, cascading down his dark arms. The repetition of it.  
It was a sensory overload. The pounding in his ears, the shivers of cold, like icicles; running his neck, even the beads of water on his lenses, sliding down his nose and into his mouth like sweetened tears.  
Like a more pleasant drowning.  
It was enough pretend he could run like this. On autopilot, all day.  
It was enough for him to not have to think about It.  
About Him.

Harry was in London. Muggle london. Standing outside a quaint little bookshop huddled modestly against the trees surrounding it. He'd been walking around town and it had caught his eye, as it had indeed appeared wizard like. In fact, Harry would've believed it had been so, if not for the abundance of normally dressed muggles, and not a gaggle of Merlin doppelgangers wearing nothing but dungarees and bright orange socks.

Harry shook that image violently from his mind and looked up. The gilded, yet worn letters read Firehouse Reads. It looked a miserable thing. Quivering, confined against the side of the road, pushed out by the much larger, much flashier banks and supermarkets. It was a mish-mash of bricks toppled haphazardly against one another and ready to crumble.

It looked small and helpless, and because it did, Harry stopped to consider it.

To tell the truth, Harry had never really been one for books. But he'd like to have been. He'd always seen their many pages as a overwhelming mountain of monotony, and so had never even bothered to pick one up, aside from his school books.  
Perhaps it had helped that the Dursley's had spoiled Dudley rotten with Bedtime lullabies in his youth, whilst Harry had been forced to watch the paint crusting within the walls of his cupboard, and the dust falling onto his glasses with each movement up the stairs. Sometimes Harry had wished his ceiling had indeed been as unstable as it appeared, and he'd wished it to fall on him and-

Harry dug the point of the penknife he'd stolen into his palm. It bled but it was a comfort in his pocket. 

No. He would not think. He would not think about any of it. Not here.

The little bell above the door gave a soft chime as it opened. Some stranger left carrying what seemed to be an ungodly amount of books, and Harry, with one foot in the door, stepped inside.

                                       -

It was warm inside, and a hushed silence descended over Harry, so different from the pouring of the rain outside.

It was silent.  
It hurt.

Harry hated it. Hated the silence because it made him think.

But, he reasurred himself, he would not have to stand it for much longer. Tonight he would finish this.

This was his day. His day to explore the things he had never been able to. To distract himself with mediocrity. To pretend, that what he had wished for, for so long was mere fantasy. He would leave this Earth with a taste of the normality that had been ripped from him the moment he had turned 11. 

Pretending to be a muggle was cleansing. It was a world away from the pain of the War. The pain he could not cope with. The very thing which had been his safe haven, his home, had now turned on him. Caresses had turned to talons.

It was unsustainable, though. Living as a muggle indefinitely. He was too damaged. Too enlightened to be satisfied with a life so simple, and every time he looked down at his frayed muggle jeans with the hole in the knee, he imagined the Dursleys as they stood and tore at him with barbed tongues unti he lay, a bleeding boy upon the floor.  
He'd realised by now that both his worlds were filled with suffering.  
He was filled with suffering.

Harry Potter was a red flag to danger. A disease.

He could not escape. From either of them. He did not belong. And so he must turn out the lights himself. Tonight.

But. For now, he was going to write.

\- 

Harry could feel his morbidity rolling off of himself in waves.  
Thick, black treacle. He felt clingy and his sickly sweet apologies seemed to sour on the page, like the ink in which he wet the quill.

Dear Mione, 

I am sorry.

 

Dear Ron,

I... I

He crumpled the parchments and vanished them. Not caring he was in a room full of muggles, holding a quill and a wand.

The truth of it was... how could Harry begin? A note seemed such a cheap disservice to the people who had saved him. Who were just that bit not strong enough to do it again.  
Who would be going spare at his absence, tearing the hair from their heads with fear and overprotective irrationality. 

How could he even put into words. His other halves. His Hermione with her face stern and her baffling intelligence and drive.  
And Ron, with his heart softer than was wise and larger than was necessary.  
Who was beautifully hot headed and so wonderfully open and giving with all of his emotions all of the time.

Harry loved them so much.  
So so much.

But they had each other. There was nothing else here for him. He was dispensible. Collateral damage for the world's successes.

He though of Nevile and Luna and Ginny. Of Dumbledore and Snape. And still he had nothing. Could say nothing.  
The ink dropped fat tears upon the parchment. The tears Harry himself could never seem to shead.

Dear Malfoy,

I saw you cry. How'd you do it? 

 

Harry winced at his own bitterness. Still, he decided he'd write this one, perhaps it'd teach Malfoy at lesson. Harry smirked and hated himself for it, writing letters that, deep down, he knew he was too cowardly to send.

After what seemed like an eternity, Harry looked at the muggle clock upon the wall and sighed, equal parts fear and relief. 

Nothing could help him.

Harry packed up his things and left.  
Tonight he told himself.

Tonight.

-

Draco Malfoy was composing.

Of course, no one would have known had they looked at him.  
He had disguised himself with a disillusionment charm where he sat in a secluded spot of the Hogwarts library. He'd been writing for hours. Writing for so long that his hand was cramped from the pain of it.  
Humming  
Humming...

A constantly melody, punctuated only through breaks to chew upon his quill and wince, twitching his newly bitten fingernails.  
Perhaps the work was monotonous, yes. But he loved it. For so long, Draco had created so much bad. It leaked out of him. Out of every pore. Dripping onto the floor before him. Throughout the war this had gone tenfold. Sometimes he cannot bear to think on it.

It has been nice to create something good. Andromeda had recommended it, after Narcissa had seen him, a broken boy, upon the floor covered in firewhiskey and vomit, and sent her straight to him for a 'private appointment'.  
His mother never says therapy.

Malfoys don't have therapy.  
They don't have weaknesses. 

Sometimes he sorely wishes he weren't such a garish anomaly. 

Draco is drawn from his thoughts rather forcefully by Granger rummiting around making a god awful racket.  
She can't see him, but Draco can see her, and she's starting to grate on his nerves.

"Madam Pince, oh I am terribly sorry to disturb you, but Harry's missing again! Have you seen him around here today?"

Draco watches with acute irritation as Granger throws her hands to her face in some exaggerated display of distress.

"It's just I've been ever so worried and ... Gosh, I just don't understand where he has even been?!" He winces at this as Granger manages to go into ultrasound, her voice is so shrill. He doesn't so much see Pince foaming at the mouth, but can he feel it.

"Yes, fine, sorry! Well please tell me if you find him, it's just Harry has been so...so..."

Draco listens to her voice fade away with pleasure. He hears the library door click softly shut again, and closes his eyes. Silence.  
Right, where was he?  
Draco sighs, resisting the urge to spit in Potter's face when he deigns to grace the library with his presence for subjecting him to Grangers mud-  
muggleborn harping. 

At this thought, Draco feels a tinge of self directed anger. He really is trying to shake the weight of his father's shadow.  
Trying to soften his edges, out of both desire and necessity.  
When he looks in the mirror, it is all he sees, draped like a cloak over his frail eleven year old self, shivering and barely standing over the weight of it.

He knows he is an awful person.  
He knows he must repent.

And yet, sometimes, a part of him still wishes he'd broken more than just Potter's nose on the train in sixth year.  
With this, Draco watches the head of the quill pass through his painstaking work. The ink bleeds through the veins of the parchment.

 

Later on, Draco tries to wash off the ink.

It stains his fingertips black.

 

-

 

Softly 

Softly

Harry guides the door to one of the many Astronomy rooms shut with a soft click.

He's always liked the room. Hated the subject. The many myriad of confusing names of gods he doesn't care about and mathematical principles he doesn't understand had frustrated him.  
But he'd always liked the balcony.

Staring up at the stars and spelling away the air pollution to reveal a million lights. Like a million eyes staring back at him, grounded within smoky blue sockets. Harry had imagined flying upwards and away as he lay his head against the glass upon the occasional late night Astronomy class.  
Softly  
Floating  
On the snowy white of Hedwig's wings.

But she's dead. Crumbled into the snow and melting- like salt.  
Harry still sees it in his dreams.

Soon he'll be dreaming too.

There's a rickety piano huddled in the corner of the room as well, although when Harry presses a finger to the ivory key, he knows it's retained its pitch- even to his amateur ears.  
As he blinks, Harry thinks he sees a glimmer of speckled light  
Like suspended dust in the air.

Ultimately it does not shift again and he is not looking for anything and so Harry chalks it up to the pitch spell upon the keys.

Harry sighs and walks over to the large expanse of floor in front of him. The ceilings are nice; tall and gothic and painted with such talent that the paisley design seems to shimmer itself like the stars before him.  
There are no portraits here. No watchful eyes, crinkled and smiling to stalk him.  
To dissuade him.

He think there are worse places to die than here.

No hateful faces to judge him even. No Malfoy to provoke him- although he'll still probably dance on Harry's grave given the chance. The thought should be disturbing, and it is, but he smirks a little at the farce of it all. At Malfoy. He doesn't even blame him deep down, he thinks. Despite his words, despite the crumpled letter of hurt; an exorcism of his grief towards the boy who was his constant and his opposite, within his pocket.  
Harry wishes him well. 

Perhaps you become more forgiving before the darkness closes in on you, Harry thinks.

He cannot bear to think of Mione and Ron. The pain in their eyes.  
There has been so much...so much...stuff.  
A clot of pain and joy and love inside of him. Of the three of them.  
His saviours. He holds them close to him.  
He knows the weight of them, their significance, instinctively.  
But he cannot bring himself to burst the dam.  
To think on them.  
Or he will break.

Harry wishes them well, most of all.  
He stares up the glass, sees the stars gathered, crowded around him- almost as if they are watching him. Eyes above him and in front of him.  
Grey eyes.

He holds his wand aloft and points it at his own skull, a jewel of life and consciousness and everything that makes him Harry.

Two words. Two words that will bring him peace. And death. Cobwebs in his hair and an empty skull. A blank mind.

He goes to speak.


	2. Leonis Minoris

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The tune is so sad that it's almost too much. Made even more intense by the reprieve Harry feels from feeling like a captive prisoner in his own head. It's exhausting, not being able to think about this, or comprehend that. Having to tip-toe down through the corridors of his mind. His eleven year old self, barefooted and small in his pale blue pyjamas. Pulling open doors only to have them scream in agony at him, watching, alert for the slightest creak that tells him not to go there.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys, 
> 
> Here is the second chapter of Letters to Death. Sorry to leave it on such a cliff-hanger, eek! But the next part is finally here.
> 
> As always comments and kudos go a long way! Thank you to everyone who has engaged so far, I love chatting about these darling boys so don't hesitate to drop me a message ! <3 
> 
> Enjoy!
> 
> PP x

"I'VE HAD ENOUGH, I'VE SEEN ENOUGH, I WANT OUT, I WANT IT TO END, I DON'T CARE ANYMORE!"

-

Draco glances at his own pale fingers as they splay across ivory keys.  
The ink still splatters them from earlier.  
His hand is a canvas. Black on white.  
An inversion of the constellations that stare down upon him in the Astronomy room.

He adores the gravity of it. The silence.  
It is one of the only times in which he feels peace. That the incessant ringing in his ears dissolves.  
He falls apart within the notes that he plays; that he's composed upon the grand piano before him. He is separated from himself.

He's no longer watching Katie Bell as she twists in the air screaming, and the sky crackles with dread and despair.

He's no longer watching as he cracks Potter's nose like bone china, bloodied scarlet and crumpled into the floor of the stationary train.

He's no longer a worm. Cowardly. Quivering in the dirt and rain, holding up his shaking wrist, a curse- a death sentence close to bleeding, falling. Two words.

Avada Kedavra

 Nearly out of his mouth like warm water, until he catches them.  
It doesn't matter. Dumbledore still falls. He floats down to the ground like a feather. Wisps of his white hair catching the wind. Draco will never forget the sight.

And finally he is no longer staring death in the face as it stalks him in his sleep.

 

He is simply a vessel. Music bleeds out of him and it is the most wonderful pain.

And so Draco comes here. Every night without failure. He gazes up at the myriad of stars that twinkle emerald green in the dark.

And he breathes in his freedom, his reprieve.

For a while he forgets the loneliness that settles into the pit of his stomach, forgets his sins that haunt him. He forgets his bitterness and smart remarks.

He is okay.

That is, until the door creaks open. 

 

Draco starts, and quickly places a disilliusionment charm upon himself in a last ditch attempt at disguise.

Shit. Had he not performed muffliato on the room?

He shivers at the cold, treacle-like feeling of the enchantment and hopes desperately that is isn't Filtch and his dreadful animal come to sniff him out.

 

When Harry Potter enters the room, Draco bites his tongue sharply to stop himself from sighing.

Of fucking course.

Saint Potter, back from his daily vanishing act, and sent by Merlin to try Draco.

He watches, quietly seething as Potter stumbles around aimlessly.  
His face holds an expression so...vacant. So... dead, that Draco actually thinks Potter might faint.  
'Just like he did in third year', Draco remembers with relish.

And yet to his disappointment, Harry does no such thing....

He's never noticed before, but Harry Potter walks as if the world is ablaze behind him.

And this would be all well and good... If he were not walking towards Draco.  
Looking like he had that day when he'd saved him from a fiery death.  
Looking like a god.  
Hades in the flesh.  
Draco thinks to himself that Potter must in fact be so, because he's moving towards Draco with such an incongruous look, that it's making his head spin...  
Making him dizzy, and inciting the same bitter smoke heavy and cloying in his throat as if Potter had instead kicked him from his firebolt that day, and left Draco to burn into the blackened carpet.

Potter looks...wrong.  
There's an air of something so dangerous, so volatile, within him that for a moment he thinks Potter will not hesitate to kill him when he sees through Draco's charmwork.  
It's not something that Draco has ever seen before.  
Not even when Potter had cursed him in sixth year.

It makes Draco close his eyes, and slowly place a hand atop his own mouth to soften his breathing. He braces himself.

But Potter's staring past him.

What meets Draco's ears is indeed not the startled sound of Potter's shocked yell, but the chime of a single note upon the piano that Draco is sat at.  
Draco shifts slightly, sure Potter is going to find him and say God knows what.  
But instead he just walks over to the other side of the room. 

Draco watches curiously, and tries to pretend that his heart is not beating out of his chest.

 

When Potter reaches the middle of the classroom he pauses with a quiet sort of determination and raises his wand to his temple.

What?

A shock of fear drills through Draco's spine thick and sharp.

What the fuck is he doing?  
Has Potter been cursed? Fuck.

He fucking knew he was acting strangely! 

Draco's too far away to stop him without startling Potter with a poised wand, and a feeling of upmost dread is starting to unfold in Draco's stomach. A desperation to act.  
The life debt. He has to repay it to Potter... he must. The compulsion is unbearable and entirely physical.  
The twisting in his stomach is made worse still when Draco realises that if Potter is found injured here, or worse... Draco and his magical signature will be already have coated the place. 

Fuck.

Draco's not sure how it happens. But it does. All he wants to do is save stupid Potter.  
His mind is screaming at him but he doesn't even think.

He focuses on his fingers as they slid across piano keys, moments before. He hums the melody as he whispers the incantation, calling to his patronus begging, cluching from the depths of his soul at something tangible.  
Something, anything to get him out of this fucking confusing situation.

He doesn't know what he is doing precisely. Only that he is overwhelmed with the certainty that it will work.  
The muscle memory of it is strange and instinctual.

He allows his happiness, his peace to fill  
him up.

He feels it before he sees her.

Draco watches his patronus gallop over towards Potter, knocking the wand from his hand with her chin. He watches still, as Potter blinks, distracted, at the ethereal thestral stood before him composed of cobalt whisps. Her large eyes bore into him and Potter reaches a hand out to touch her...

Draco wonders if it's broken the curse.  
He feels as if he will cry from the humilliation.

A thestral?

The irony is not lost on Draco. It seems as if he was wrong when he fears that death is stalking him. No, he ammends. He is death. After all it's all he's ever caused. 

Oh how funny it seems to Draco that his thestral looks eerily like Potter's stag, yet with the flesh stripped off. Skeletal, and carnivorous. It suits Draco well.  

Still, Draco watches Potter's hand pass through his patronus. He can see the peace as it washes over him, purely because they are his own emotions reflected back at him. He knows that Potter feels it, can hear the melody he was playing too, light and soft fingers upon the keys like the gentle accordion of rain as it drums the windows outside.

The thestral gallops around Potter curiously. She turns to stop, stood framed against the now open door, and dissolves into mist and dust.

He watches as Potter darts towards the exit, presumably (and idiotically) to chase after it.

And he sits in stunned silence until he no longer sees Harry Potter's green eyes in the stars that linger above him.

Many hours later, Draco himself will leave. He will notice the crumpled piece of parchment upon the floor, and pocket it, before it can hiss softly under his crush of his foot.

 

-

Upon entering his dorm at half past three that night, Harry sinks into bed feeling equal parts shameful and amazed.  
He watches numbly as his invisibility cloak, shimmering, slides off of his bed to the floor unused.  
The incessant drumming in his head finally appears to have stopped, likely pacified by the hum of that patronus, Harry reasons. But still he feels agitated. There's a million questions that he does not want to answer, and for once, he falls into a fitfill sleep. He does not dream. But there is a melody- a dashing of notes that lulls him, slight footed, chasing his usual nightmares of Voldemort, of Sirius' last gasp of breath as his soul deserts him, of Malfoy burning to death, then slashed open in ribbons of blood, peeling apart in Harry's crimson hands, far away. 

He doesn't wake until morning. Doesn't wake until he feels a heavy weight upon his chest, like he's suffocating. Harry opens his eyes abruptly, his mouth ready to scream. He thrashes about wildly. Suddenly he's back in his cupboard, watching as the walls close in on him. He's begging the Dursley's to let him out. Tears streaming across his face...

"Please..."

There's a loud crash and a low groan. 

"Owwww!"

"Fucking hell, mate! You're gonna give me permanent brain damage." 

Harry's brought back to himself rapidly. It is then that Harry sees a smudge of red hair at the bottom of his bed. 

"Ron?" Harry murmurs, reaching for his glasses. It's hard to get the words out. Harry finds that his voice is unusually thick with sleep. He doesn't normally get more than an hour...

As Harry's watches Ron's sheepish grin come into focus, he sighs with exasperated relief. 

"F...for fuck's sake..." Harry breathes and offers a hand to the boy sprawled on the floor in front of him. He notices suddenly that he's almost hyperventillating. 

"Ron! Can you not ...fucking do ....that? You know how I hate it. You scared the shit out of me!" He manages. Harry's still a little mad, and fervently embarrassed, but despite himself he can feel his lips twitching into a smile at his best friend. He feels a sharp glimmer of affection at Ron's suddenly worry struck face. He drops Harry's hand suddenly like it had burnt him.

"Oh shit. I'm sorry, Harry. I forgot how claustrophobic you were. God, that was a shit thing to do. I wasn't thinking..." He bites his lip.  
"I was just surprised to see you asleep for once. It was supposed to be a joke. Though I had to wake you. It's nearly 8, you know," 

Harry groans and offers Ron his hand again. He takes it, and rises to his feet, rubbing the back of his neck awkwardly. 

"Again, I'm really sorry mate. I owe you a butterbear for that one,"

Harry gives a twisted attempt at a smile. Ron pales at this, at the hunted look that must shimmer in Harry's eyes. With a rush of guilt, Harry suspects that Ron must think it's his doing. That Harry's scared.  
He wishes to tell him, yes, it is his doing.  
It's his doing, for how much he cares. How much Harry loves him for it. How fiercely and bitterly scared Harry is to lose him willingly, and how close he came to...to.  
How his time with his best friend was, is, numbered. 

Better still how it is his own fucking fault. 

He says none of this. He merely claps Ron on the back. "It's fine honestly, please stop babbling. You're turning into Mione! Come on, Let's get ready,"

-

When they leave the common room for breakfast, Harry begins to remember the events of the previous night more clearly. A cold icy feeling of shame unfurls in the pit of his stomach. By the time he's reached his seat, it has spread all the way down to the tips of his fingers, and they shake. He sits down steadily, and reluctantly helps himself to some bacon.

He watches silently as Ron and Hermione get into yet another bickering match, eventually tuning out Hermione's shrill protestations of "Don't be ridiculous, Ronald".

His fingers tapping gently on the oak table. That damned melody still in his head.

With each passing moment, the feeling of icy dread in his stomach was turning to talons. Like icicles prodding at him whenever he went to grab another slice of toast. 

Someone must have been following him last night. Did they know what he'd been planning. Surely not? Harry had never voiced his intentions, not even in solitude, for fear of a lurking student or nosy portrait watching him secretly.  
He suddenly felt hunted. Like a rabbit caught between facing down a fox and and jumping off a cliff. Were they watching him right now? Closing in on him like his cupboard walls...

Harry looked around, but all he saw were Malfoy's grey eyes, blazed full of some intense emotion. Nothing new there he supposed, Draco was always fucking mad at him. Today he appeared particularly incensed though. At the prospect of this, a thrill of excitement gripped Harry. Perhaps Malfoy would punch him. Like he used to. Perhaps they could go back to normal...

After all, Malfoy had an extremely tight grip on the goblet that he was holding, which looked as if it might burst into flames where his long fingers curled around it, just like...  
Harry paled immediately at the gravity of what he had said and he was stuck with the ridiculous desire to leap over the three tables before him and dash the cup from his grasp, lest the fiendfire...lest the flames consume him.

He told himself to stop being stupid. They were fine. Both of them completely unsinged. But it did nothing to stop the fire he saw ghosted in Malfoy's irises. Harry couldn't bear to look at him any longer, and so he returned his thoughts to last night again.  
Malfoy always brought up bad memories.

 

Fuck. What if the mystery person told someone... fuck. Fuck...  
What would Mione and Ron say?

He didn't think he could stand it.

Harry consoled himself with the fact that, if they were indeed going to tell someone, would they not have done it immediately?  
Still, the idea of someone, especially someone unknown, having seen him in such a state of raw vulnerability was...disturbing.  
Maybe they thought he had been struck by some sort of curse. Merlin knows he must have looked possessed!  
But why had they not told anyone? Or shown themselves? It was a cowardly move that ruled out many of the gryffindors, even those that Harry wasn't personally acquainted with. 

There was a minute chance that the patronus had happened upon Harry coincidentally, but it was extremely unlikely; and even Harry wasn't fooling himself that much. No. Someone was there, Harry knew it as plainly as the scar on his forehead.

He thought back to the song of the patronus. It had replaced the hum of voices, the screams in his mind. He was indeed thankful for that, and yet certain that it would fade. That Harry would be again subjected to the constant hiss of Nagini's tongue as she devoured another corpse.  
Fuck. He wanted to die.

For a second he wanted to tear that damned patronus to shreads.

Oddly, Harry's anger made him think about Sectumsempra, and the brief moment of glee he'd felt at seeing Malfoy's pale figure sprawled across the dirty bathroom floor. Before he'd noticed the damage he'd done, he'd had every intention of jumping atop Malfoy and scratching blunt nails into his stupid pointy face.  
Punching  
Punching him, and screaming at him until his voice went hoarse with the pain of it.

Still, Harry felt like a monster when he'd noticed what he'd done. The blood dashed along his shirt so casually. Like an ink splatter across parchment. Harry hated Snape and his fucking maliciousness, and he hated himself as much for casting the thing. The image of Draco's blood soaked body was burned into his retinas. It was the reason that Harry had held onto the penknife he'd nicked from muggle London several nights ago. The reason he had drawn lines across his own chest in some parody of the event, in some bizzare rendition of vigilante justice, of an eye for an eye, because Harry had to pay for his sins, and because the pain he could handle... it was the nothingness that killed him... dementor-esque like a black veil across his eyes, it stole his breath.  
Harry supposed he'd done it out of guilt. Or maybe because he felt like he didn't feel guilty enough. 

Harry was a bad person. There was no doubt about it, and the truth of it was that sometimes he wondered if Sectumsempra had doomed or saved Malfoy that night.

 

-

 

Harry was torn from his thoughts by a hand on his shoulder. Hermione was staring up at him.

"Harry... Are you alright? You look dreadfully pale! I've... Yesterday I was looking for..." She gave a small cough, looking suddenly sheepish. Just as Ron had this morning. Harry hated himself for being such a burden to his friends. 

"We're worried about you, Harry. You're barely around anymore, and you never tell us where you've gone. I don't want to pry but... we miss you, is all." She whispered.  

"If you need to speak to someone about the war..." She trailed off evidently seeing something in Harry's expression. Harry knew she was close to tears, and another stone was placed atop Harry's head drowning him further in guilt and shame.

Harry had taken to picking imaginary lint off of his robe. Hermione's small hand burnt into his shoulder where it lay still. Harry took a deep breath and plastered a large grin across his face, though it didn't meet his eyes. He turned his hand face up upon the table. An invitation. Hermione slipped hers into his. Grasping him as if she were afraid he'd disappear like smoke before her. He turned, and he knew she'd fall for it. 

"I'm fine truly. You know I slept much better last night. But i'll keep it in mind," It was a half-truth but Harry supposed it was better than a lie. It pacified her.  
Harry couldn't help but feel a burst of warmth at her toothy grin as they left, hand in hand to go to Charms.  
 

-

 

Later, Harry was, if nothing else, warm from the pleasant meal he'd enjoyed at dinner. As well as briefly distracted from his pains after having played a game of exploding snap with Ron- Mione had even joined in, and to Ron's dismay, beaten him. He watched everyone settle down to sleep that night. Harry however, didn't even bother going to bed. 

He'd barely remembered any of the lessons he'd had today. The voices were returning with ferocity and with them, Harry's inability to concentrate on anything but the blood on his hands.  
He was trapped once again.  
Gaunt and bloodied arms were pulling at him wherever he went, twisting his guts up into something awful. Dragging him into the carpet.

He'd tried thinking of his parents. Of Hermione, or Ron in an attempt to conjure his own patronus. Perhaps it would soothe him as the thestral had? But of course, he could conjure nothing but a few wispy streams of blue into the black solitude of his dormitory.

That patronus he'd seen had been an interesting one. Harry had never heard of a thestral patronus before. It seemed, in a way, paradoxical that something so saturated with joy as a patronus could conjure something so heavily associated with death and pain. He supposed that he had still found thestrals themselves to be endearing creatures. They were gentle, yet put on a good front of menace. Unlike any other creature Harry could think of. Perhaps he was being silly but some small part of Harry felt relieved, because oddly, he feels as if he can trust someone who conjures such a misunderstood animal. Trust them not to run to the papers with tales of Potter the Depressed.  
He wondered to himself who she belonged to. It's much more likely to have been someone in the upper years to be able to cast a corporeal patronus. Perhaps it was a teacher? A thrill of humilliation passes through Harry at this and he stops his train of thought dead. The icy feeling in stomach was beginning to return...

He pushes it out of his mind because it is easier. Slips out of his dormitory, grabs his cloak- and bloody well uses it this time, he berates himself- and climbs out of the portrait hall.  
He knows he shouldn't but there's a tightness in his chest pulling him in the direction of that same damned room.  
Maybe he can figure out who was following him? Detect their magical signatures and sort between a likely suspect?  
Harry loses hope. What is he supposed to say to them, when, if, he does find out? What does anyone say in that situation? What is Harry even going to do about it? 

Still he walks the same route and slips inside, sure that they- whoever they were- would not be stupid enough to come back.  
Despite his situation, Harry feels some semblance of peace as he enters the starry room before him. This time, he walks across to the large window sill, and casts a cushioning charm upon it. His usual spot.  
Harry pulls his cloak about him, still over his head and sits down. It's not raining this time. He places a hand upon the glass, wishing it would disappear so he could thrust a hand out into the cool night sky and watch the moonbeams dance along his arm. 

When he looks back over towards the piano, he nearly yells. There's a figure sat at the piano. He quietly shoves his glasses back up his nose from where they'd nearly slid to the floor.  
Now he can see it clearly. The midnight air shimmering around Draco Malfoy's blonde head. 

For a moment, Harry is paralysed with shock. Could Malfoy have been the one to see him? He can't have? For if he had why had he not found some horrendous way to blackmail his own silence?  
Harry realises his hand still pressed against the window is shaking violently and steadies himself.

The relief rushes through Harry's every pore like a warm bath.  
It can't have been him.  
For Malfoy can't conjure a patronus. He'd remembered the whispers amongst students at the beginning of the year. Had heard of the special Defence class for Slytherins only, because they had not been taught how to defend themselves as well as the other houses without a myriad of Dumbledore's Army sessions. The whole house felt it was shameful, Harry knew, but it was preferrable to being defenceless. Especially in a world that was suspicious of all who wore so much as a green tie.

At the time he'd been pleased. Smug. He had always been so smug. And yet, now Harry realises- when he cannot conjure his own stag to guide him, he Harry, left fumbling in the darkness- what a horrible feeling it is. 

Harry's notices that he's writing something. Scribbling madly.  
There's ink on his cheek, Harry notices.  
He watches curiously as Malfoy lays down the elusive parchment in front of him and begins to play. 

For a second Harry thinks... He wonders if it's the same song, if he had indeed been there last night after all, despite what logic would dictate.

But it's not. It's different, but just as melodic. There's a sorrowful tone to the piece Malfoy is playing. Like he's breaking apart within the notes he plays, and Harry can tell at once that he's unhappy about something. Can tell by the way he clings to the piano, folds into it, like he needs the support. As plainly, as if he were spelling his emotions across the ivory keys. Harry feels himself relax against the window. He doesn't know why, but there's something about the way in which Malfoy plays that is entrancing. Beautiful. Harry, rather shamefully, feels a heavy weight settle in his chest, at the relief of something, anything to soothe the thoughts which haunt him every single minute of the day.  
The tune is so sad that it's almost too much. Made even more intense by the reprieve Harry feels from feeling like a captive prisoner in his own head. It's exhausting, not being able to think about this, or comprehend that. Having to tip-toe down through the corridors of his mind. His eleven year old self, barefooted and small in his pale blue pyjamas. Pulling open doors only to have them scream in agony at him, watching, alert for the slightest creak that tells him not to go there.

Thankfully, he moves into a softer piece. It feels like the soft drizzle of rain that has begin to pour outside the window. It's a background hum. It doesn't impose upon him, and yet it's enough to distract Harry from the pain he feels. Malfoy's playing is actually calming. Harry absentmindedly notes that he's very good. Whilst Draco Malfoy is frequently one of those doors that he cannot open, Harry feels surprising okay about sitting there, a few feet away from him. The parchment Malfoy had scribbled upon was blocking his face from view on the piano stand, and Harry is glad. Glad not to have to glance into his grey eyes. They make Harry think things that he does not understand.

He stays like that. Listening to Malfoy playing all night. 

 

-

 

If Draco had looked up from where his eyes were focused on his work, perhaps he would have seen the handprint that lay, smudged against the dark glass of the window sill, or even noticed the curious shimmer within that general direction.

Ocassionally he feels eyes on him, but he imagines it is merely the watchful eye of the moon.

He plays on.


	3. Corvus

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When I caught you, sobbing, in that bathroom. It was one of the most interesting things I'd ever seen. It was obscene. Your eyes were so red, and you were gasping like you were drowning. The fat tears that trickled down your cheeks looked like little cherubs. I was so fucking confused. I didn't know what to do with myself. Part of me wanted to grab you...and... I don't know what. Shake you perhaps? The other half wanted to run away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi guys!!
> 
> Here's the next chapter! Sorry for the delay, things have been very busy for me!
> 
> I hope you enjoy. Sorry this chapter is a little shorter than usual but I'll be making up for it with another chapter very soon! 
> 
> Comments and kudos are appreciated as usual <3 
> 
> PP x

When Draco leaves the Astronomy rooms that night his wrists ache like mad. His neck cricks painfully from where he had sat, hunched over the piano, lost in the rhythm. Draco thinks to himself ruefully that his father would be ashamed, for Malfoy's don't slouch.  
He doesn't know whether to feel proud or humiliated that he's different.  
That deep down he knows he's always been so.

Upon entering the slytherin dungeon, everyone is still asleep. There is a quiet kind of peace about the house in the early hours. Like a cool breath of fresh air on soft winters' morning. The constant ripple of the water outside is comforting. It is its own melody. Draco can never tell if the sun has risen though. The inky blackness outside the windows doesn't ever reveal itself, but Draco thinks he can see a crowd of Merpeople gathered a ways away, so it must be at least four in the morning.

Draco sinks down into a plush settee by the emerald fire. He had intended to catch some last minute rest before morning but he could tell immediately from the way his hands were trembling that it just wasn't going to happen. Evidently, he's still shaken up from the Potter Incident. Over the past two days, Draco had done his upmost to ignore Potter The Prick. He had taken the greatest care not to pull at the thread of what had happened that night, lest it all come undone, and with it Draco's sanity.  
It had felt like a dream at the time, and was growing steadily more surreal as time went on.

As much as he hated to admit it, Draco was severely confused about the events of the night previous. Draco had thought that news would have travelled around the school immediately of Harry Potter being cursed. Had thought that McGonagall would be interogating him under veritaserum as soon as he woke up today, and asking him why on Earth Draco's magical signature was scattered across the same room in which Saint Potter had nearly cursed his own brains out. Even Draco had to admit, he'd suspect Draco if he was Potter. 

But Potter said nothing. In fact he acted as if nothing had changed. At first, Draco had wondered if he'd been obliviated. The only thing which soothed this rather disturbing train of though was that Potter looked like shit. He looked truly troubled. When Draco had watched him surreptitiously over his pumpkin juice at breakfast, he had looked as if he might keel over any minute. He was almost grey. Greyer than he'd looked swathed in moonlight that fateful night. 

Greyer than he'd even looked as he'd knelt above Draco's bleeding body, gasping, "no..."  
And oh Merlin, Draco was thinking about it again.  
He thought about it all the time.  
Clear as day.  
He dreamt about it.  
How Potter had sliced him, all over.

Draco knew he was being silly now. But ironically, that had been the first time he'd seen Potter as his saviour.  
Draco could remember how he'd fallen.  
Fallen before he'd even felt any pain.  
He'd crumpled like parchment. Let himself give up.  
And as he felt the icy cool water, pooling under his back, soaking his shirt translucent, he thought that he would die.  
Had even perhaps hoped he would.

He remembered Potter's blurred face above him. It faded in and out of view, glassy from the tears of pain in Draco's eyes. He was clutching at his shirt, screaming for help and spitting as he yelled. And for a second he felt like thanking him.  
Had half expected to die then and there with Potter clinging to him.  
Holding him, until the light behind his eyes disappeared.  
It was a poetic fantasy. A stupid one at that, but he couldn't shake it from his mind. He replayed it in his head constantly.  
It garnered a vindictive pleasure from Draco that yes, Potter was a malicious bastard. He may have saved them all but Draco knew intimately the blood that steadily dripped from his dark hands. How he was just as cold as the rest of them.  
As cold as Draco.  
Not a nightmare, but a longing. A longing for... what exactly. Draco was a Slytherin, he cared a huge deal for self preservation, and Draco knew that he was fucked up from the war. He definitely didn't want to die though. Typical. Only Harry Potter could make him want to die.

Only you, Potter.

With a sigh, Draco shakes the image from his head and thinks back to Potter's pale face at breakfast.

Potter must have felt his eyes on him then, for he had looked up at him. Draco remembered how his eyes were dull and glassy and his hand kept shaking where it clutched at his fork as he attempted to shovel bacon into his mouth, long after he'd looked away.  
He looked like an explosion...  
In fact, Draco shifted in his settee, he sometimes thought Potter had to be-

But he was drawn from his thoughts by a soft crackle.

The letter.

Of course!

How could Draco have forgotten the letter?  
He hastily opened it, running a hand down it in an attempt to smooth out the creases that lay deep within the parchment, like veins.  
Harry Potter's chicken scratch scrawl was instantly recognisible to Draco.

To his shock, the letter was addressed to him. Draco gripped his wand reflexively. Just in case this was all a huge trick and Potter was going to appear out of nowhere in the Slytherin common room and hex him to death.  
He waited.

Nothing happened. Draco supposed that he was paranoid, and finally allowed himself to breathe.

He took a deep breath and started to read. 

 

-

 

Dear Malfoy,

I saw you cry. How'd you do it?

I can't ever seem to manage. Not anymore. Even when I went to die in the forest. Even when I put my fist through the glass in the Astronomy room one night.  
You know, I kept breaking the glass and reparo-ing it again just to break it once more.  
Crash. Reparo. Crash. Reparo. Crash. My blood was dripping down the stone window pane, rolling, although it didn't get very far. And my hand was a state. You would've fainted Malfoy.  There were pieces of glass embedded in it, and they caught the moonlight as I turned it over and over in fascination and horror. 

Still I just stared.

I wonder what you would have done if you were me. Better yet if you had seen me. I wonder what I would have done. Perhaps then I would have cried, if only out of humiliation.

I remember your face the day we both thought you were dying. You still remind me of death, Malfoy. I wonder why that is.

When I caught you, sobbing, in that bathroom. It was one of the most interesting things I'd ever seen. It was obscene. Your eyes were so red, and you were gasping like you were drowning. The fat tears that trickled down your cheeks looked like little cherubs. I was so fucking confused. I didn't know what to do with myself. Part of me wanted to grab you...and... I don't know what. Shake you perhaps? The other half wanted to run away.

You were so vulnerable, and it was so fucking wrong. So out of character. You seemed so spoilt even then. Crying like that. I don't think I could justify your humanity. Or even comprehend it. 

You looked just like I did. When I was trapped in my cupboard. Angry, small, lost and so fucking miserable. You were looking in a mirror and so was I. I was staring into my own pain. It was unbearable and I needed it to stop. 

So we fought and I cursed you. With a spell I didn't even know. And I was half expecting you to zoom towards me or something and we'd fight some more and it would be glorious. You'd be punching me still crying and Merlin you were always such distraction to me.  
You're a thunderstorm. I can never ignore you.  
You're so fucking reckless, Malfoy. Too reckless for a Slytherin. The moon could fall out of the sky and I'd still be there. Hating you.  
And you'd still be there. Hating me back twice as much. Fuck your Slytherin Prince bullshit. You were a Gryffindor and a half for me. I could always get you to twitch. To get under your skin. You'd burst so spectacularly. Admittedly, I'd get a particularly Slytherin glee from it. From watching you come apart. You always brought out the worst in me, you dick.

And then you were dying. And we were both scared as shit. It wasn't fun and exhilarating anymore. I thought it might happen that time. That I might cry. If you died. If I killed you. 

I held onto you, and I looked into your hazy eyes. They were still that piercing grey, swimming with anger and fear and something that seemed almost like peace. Perhaps, it was the heat of the moment but I swear I'd never seen anything so beautiful.

It's true that I hate you. It's also true that I'm so fucking sorry. That I can't do anything to make it right. That all we do is glare at each other in silence.  
I don't know what I want from you.

From this.

Truth is I'd rather die than have you read this. But I suppose that's a frail declaration. Pretty funny actually, as I already want to die. That's the whole point of this.

So I suppose all I have to say is 

See you in hell, Draco.

Love, 

Harry James Potter.


	4. Eridanus

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> If anyone asked him how it happened, he couldn't have replied. It felt like his brain was stuffed with cotton wool. The voices were yelling so viciously, Harry was almost blinded by it. It felt like static on the Dursley's old muggle TV. His hand twitched where his wand lay limply in it. Ron was still holding him. He said nothing, and Harry knew he was thinking deeply. Silently, Harry was screaming at him to let go, because each moment he held him felt like choking on glass; it was fear through and through, but he couldn't get the words out because part of him craved the safety. The candle by the entrance to the dormitory was starting to distort now, and Neville's plant pot was shaking.
> 
> Harry knew he had to do it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys! :)  
> Here's the next chapter of LTD.  
> Sorry it took so long to appear. I've been working on consent fest, and I had a bout of writer's block, so I've been pretty busy, all in all.  
> A huge thank you to KaterineBlack for helping bounce around some ideas when I was stuck <3 It's been a great help to have a fresh perspective.  
> And thanks to everyone who's commented so far, it's been wonderful to chat to you guys, and to see you're as passionate as me about this story!  
> As always, comments and kudos are much appreciated! 
> 
> PP x

Harry grabs the smooth pebble in one scarred hand and flings it as hard as he can. It's funny to him, how the rolling waves and vicious tides have softened its edges. It's desperately ironic that his pain has sharpened him, fractured and stagnated him. He does not feel stronger, or smoother. He is just as scared as he ever was, and much crueller than he'd ever imagined.

He watches as it dances; skimming along the choppy surface of the water. It's quite windy down by the lake, but Harry doesn't mind. The cool air that slices and scratches at his face is a nice distraction.

This is Harry's second favourite place in Hogwarts. When the Astronomy tower is otherwise occupied during the day, the only other place that he feels safe is by the water. Sometimes he wants to jump in and dive down into its depths to explore, although so far he has not succumbed to the temptation. Perhaps if he dives far enough he could find his way outside the Slytherin dungeon, and go and scare Malfoy, or better still, try and find out when he is next going to frequent the Astronomy tower. Of course the thought is silly; but it is sufficiently amusing. In a way, he can't help but feel indebted to Malfoy. The voices haven't returned yet, thanks to whatever last night was. Harry can't quite explain why it helped him, to hear Malfoy of all people lull him to sleep, but he is grateful all the same- if rather embarrased- that the peace he feels today allows him to even visit the lake.

He had stopped coming after the desire to throw himself into the murky depths had not ceased.

Today though, Harry feels...muted. He knows that his pain is still there. He can feel it, the dull press of a knife against his throat when he gets too carefree. The voices of those he loves dying. They are still there. But they are whispering. They are echo, a mist, when most of the time they are a symphony.  
Harry recognises that this is how most other people live with pain. It will never go away, but its dull hum is quiet enough to live with, to live through. Unfortunately, this thought just makes Harry grow sicker. He knows it cannot last for him. It is temporary. A taste of relief, when he knows there is suffering to come.

It makes Harry want to die even more. He's growing sick of walking on eggshells.

Footsteps next to him draw Harry out of his own mind. His eyes focus on the long blonde hair reflected in the ripples of water below him.

"Hi Harry." Luna smiles.

Harry turns to see her, and nods a 'hello', guiltily relieved that it's not Ron or Hermione come to track him down. Harry knows they're only trying to help but it saddens him that both of them have taken to talking to him as if he were on his deathbed. Their whispers drop like the pebbles that fall out of Harry's grasp into the abyss below. Heavy, and meaningful, but ultimately insignificant.

Luna however just smiles at him, and he can't deny how much of a breath of fresh air she is when he's been feeling so suffocated recently. Harry's sentimentality catches him off guard so much that he nearly jumps out of his skin when she pulls him to his feet. Harry can smell her floral perfume, and the cold weight of her hand in his is a small comfort.

"Um. Luna? Where exactly are we going?" He did used to love Luna's free spirit, but it quite often left Harry bewildered. He doesn't know what it is exactly that he loves now. Whether he even loves anything at all. Harry used to feel everything so deeply and passionately. Lately he just seems to drift, all the air sucked out of him like a slowly deflating balloon. Still, he supposes it'd be nice to share her company. Even if he has to push himself not to pull away.

"Hm? I'm not sure. You looked restless... Where would you like to go, Harry? I've got some errands to run for Hagrid, you see. I wouldn't mind some company, and your head is all fuzzy so I think you could use the distraction, don't you think?"

Harry considers this.

"Alright, but where are we going?"

Luna doesn't reply, and Harry, used to this, decides it is easier to shut up and let himself be lead down past the lake. It's actually nice to be able to lean on someone for once. Harry can feel the prescence of Luna's magic wrapped around his fingertips. It's like standing by the large, drawn windows in the Astronomy tower and watching the curtains breathe life over the scene outside. There's something very grounding about crunching the leaves underfoot as they walk together. Perhaps it's Luna or perhaps it's just been so long since Harry has walked in company, but the whispers are still easy to ignore, and it's a small mercy, regardless of how temporary Harry knows it all is.

As they pass through the trees and down towards the Forbidden Forest, Harry's heart gives a jolt. He hasn't been back to the forest since he... died.  
It still sounds so weird to say, even now the shock of it all has worn off. Despite the constant thrum of pain in his head, in his heart, everyday. Despite the whispers that remind him that he cannot forget. Must not forget. Never ever forget his sins. The day of the battle still seems like a dream. He's torn between wondering if dying that day has made things better or worse. Wondered if there was something wrong with the resurrection stone. If dying that day had somehow sparked a morbid fascination with death. He knows it's unlikely though. Harry doesn't idealise death. He would face it to save his friends in a heartbeat of course, but he's never before wanted it for himself. He knows that they want it though. They whisper it to him everyday. How they begged for death. How it should of been Harry. Harry the pig for slaughter, who never had the decency to die. He wants to plead with them. That he's sorry. That he never wanted any of this. But he can't ever seem to get the words out, because logically, he'd only be talking to himself. Most days he wishes he'd just stayed dead, but he knows deep down that he could never handle the guilt of that. He's glad that he did what he did. Just torn up that he's caught in collateral damage of it all. He's the pin stoppering the explosion, and that is how he'd always lived.

Harry wonders now if he just doesn't know how to function without it.

"Have you ever considered being re-sorted, Harry?"

"Hm?" He's still replaying the bright green light that has flown towards him so many times now it's almost familiar. Thinking about that same patronus that saved him from it last night. The hundredth time he's been saved. He's not so scared of green light anymore. Perhaps he thinks himself invincible by now. Or perhaps he's just tired of it all. There's no room for fear to squeak through anymore.

"Well... I'd think you'd make a fine Ravenclaw."

"Why's that?" Harry humours her.

"You think too much. I can see it now. You're not really looking at me, you're seeing a whole bunch of different things inside your head. It's a wonderful trait to have of course, but sometimes you just need to feel,"

"Oh... well. I think that's easier said that done, Luna." Of course Luna would be the one to notice Harry's distracted. He supposes there's very few alive who've been able to fool her.

"I know. I used to do the same when Mum died. I saw it happen. I used replay it over and over in my head. Like I was stuck on a broken record. It was pretty horrible. But, well, I'm sure you did the same."

Harry doesn't really know what to say to this. Part of him is torn apart by it. He fucking hates the world. He hates that there's so much tragedy and pain, and he hates that someone as bright and wonderful as Luna has had to suffer so much. Despite this, the other irrational part of him is sick to his back teeth of being reminded of death, and with a jolt of horror, Harry can feel himself desensitising. He has noticed recently that he just shuts down as soon as it's mentioned. He's so angry with himself. Is he not even capable of feeling empathy for others anymore?

Still, he just nods and says nothing. A lump in his throat, but never any tears. He's too spineless to even cry. Nonetheless, Luna seems to understand, and she squeezes his hand.

"You know you remind me of her. You have the same look. I think she was also quite reckless... No offence, Harry. I know she always loved me, but there were times when I'd look at her and she'd always seem so lost. It was like I wasn't even there at all. Sometimes I'd be able to bring her out of it, but many times she'd lock herself away. She was so tangled up in her own thoughts and neither Dad nor I could untangle her." Luna seems to steady herself, and Harry notes that the lines of her face suddenly seem so much heavier than they used to. As if someone had drawn them onto her. They looked so startlingly unnatural on her. So clownlike, and yet very human all at once. Harry suddenly feels like a horrible person, but he can't quite seem to put his finger on why. Truth be told, he's dumbstruck at Luna's words. She seems so unlike herself.

She turns to look at him. "Look after yourself, Harry".

Once again, Harry doesn't really have much to say to that. Still he smiles, and this time he is surprised to note that it comes a little easier. They keep walking until the sun has fully set. He's just about to ask where they're going again, when Luna stops.

"Oh! Ron was looking for you by the way," She mentions, when they are almost to the outskirts of the woods.

"It's about tonight's Astronomy review. Hermione says we're doing a group project. I've always loved reading the stars. You can learn so much from them," She sighs wistfully.

"I think it'll be nice to sleep under the moon for once, don't you?"

"Er yeah it will be". Harry had completely forgotten about the review. Not that he'd intended to make a big deal out of it in the first place. Recently his decline in motivation hadn't allowed for a great deal of focused study, but he'd just barely managed to stay afloat under the assault of N.E.W.T's if only because he had an excuse to be alone. Still, like anything else, it was really fucking hard to study when you kept replaying the events of a War over and over in your head. But it might be nice, he supposed. Also Malfoy and the damned piano will be there. Harry doesn't really know how he should feel about that, but can't deny that his stomach jumps a little at the thought.  
He's trying desperately to push it out of his mind at the moment.

Somehow the idea of Malfoy lying a few feet away from him in nightclothes is almost hysterical to Harry. Like some bizzare parody of when he had fallen asleep against the frosted window in his own pyjamas just last night. Oddly it seemed like an eternity to Harry. How vulnerable he'd been all curled into himself like that, listening to Malfoy play...basically serenade him to sleep. Just thinking on that same vulnerability coming from Draco Malfoy leaves a rather awful taste in his mouth. Bloodied and metallic. And he can smell the sour bite of water as it rusts the bathroom pipes. He can hear the water as it pools around his ankles. This obssession with the moment when he'd shown his true colours. Those same colours, blood red, all laid out bare against Malfoy's rapidly beating heart. He hadn't even cared as he'd walked out of there. Not really. Had scurried away like Pettigrew, a coward. He had not even truly understood the weight of what he'd done.

After all, he'd been used to the Dursley's as they'd ripped him to shreds with their violent tempers and worse their disapproval bitter in his mouth. A shaking fist. A violent shove. He'd taken in all of this anger, but had nowhere to exorcise it. So it had burst inside of him. Had burst so crucially and so painfully. Not when he'd yelled the spell. But when he'd dismissed it from his mind so soon afterwards.

He hated how much a part of him they were.

Because they were his relatives, and he'd always wondered if an echo of them lived in him. For years he had tried to trace the thread that lead back to them. He'd finally found it in is actions that day.

So like...like them. When Harry used to cry in his cupboard and they turned a blind eye.

He thinks that's why he so distraught. Immediate sorrow can attempt to atone for almost any event, but Harry's callous dismissal... It hurts his chest to think about. There Harry was, selfishly using him to absolve his own sorrow, after all he's done. He doesn't deserve it. And despite all this. He's still filled with this...this twinge of passion. It's so difficult to describe. He feels like he's drowning most of the time when he's around him. The air sucked out of his throat. He wonders if it's all part of the same problem. He desperately wants to do something to find out. But Harry knows the truth. He's never been very brave. Not where it matters. Big, grandiose acts of heroism, when he knows he's on borrowed time, sure. Comfort however, being confident and expressing his love? Harry's knows he's nothing shy of a rabbit caught in the headlights.

These thoughts are even more disturbing to Harry and he swiftly drowns them out, digs his fingernails into his palm. The sharp bite preferable. The pain manageable.

When they reach the forest Harry needs to casts a lumos. It's so dark now that Harry can see the moon. It's the same moon that watched him as he died. The same moon that watched his parents dance under its light in that photo he keeps in the back pocket of his faded jeans. It just stays there, watches, privy to his pleas for death in the sweaty silence of his dorm. The whispered moans as the contorted faces he sees mould together. Eye sockets raw and bloodless faces. Comforting and yet so desolate, so alone in the sky that Harry's own pain almost feels worse.

No. Not here. He won't think.

Harry focuses on Luna. Harry thinks she's just as comforting as her namesake. She's different though. The sun and the moon. She's sunshine on a rainy day. When you can taste the saturation in the air, feel the pain and loss and yet there's something so hopeful about the rays that dance across the grounds. Almost blinding in their optimism.  
He's glad she's here.

Still he jumps when he feels a soft headbutt against his palm. A thestral likely hoping for food. Ah. So that's what Hagrid tasked Luna with. Perhaps it's ironic. That he should come here after the events of the previous week. Nevertheless he supposes he's glad he did.

He's never noticed before. Never comprehended how broken they look. They are almost like a sack of bones. Sickly looking and solemn, and yet they still carry an aura of regality. A desperate sense of calm. And Harry decides that he likes them a lot. Despite the fact that on first sight a seed of unease twitches slightly within him. Harry of all people knows insticts can be misleading.

He sighs in the cool silence as he and Luna get to feeding them.

It's dark and so Harry cannot be entirely sure, but for a second he thinks he can hear a twig snap. He thinks he often hears things that aren't truly there now and so he continues on, his palm flat and blooded where he holds the piece of meat.

If the crop of blond hair in the darkness, a few breaths away is indeed there after all, he ignores it; tells himself it's Luna and tries to distract himself as Luna's hand slips into his at his side.

He hates the tricks his mind plays on him and if Malfoy really does want to see the thestrals then Harry won't stop him.  
He's faintly humming the same tune once again and Harry is struck by the very same compulsion that had reached him on the night Sectumsempra occured. He wants to break clean of Luna and run to him. Run to him and...  
Still Harry has no answer. His brain just as thick and foggy with the same hot summer saturation under his tongue.  
They should probably turn back anyway.

They walk to the castle, contented by the whistle of the wind and the crush of wet leaves under their feet until the hum leaves them, drowned out by the castle's nighttime buzz.

 

-

 

"Okay mate?"

Harry's gazing out of the window still. He supposes he's glad they made it inside when they did. Now sheets of rain were lashing against the tiles outside. It was certainly going to be an interesting night, sleeping with that racket; but Harry is grateful for the distraction it affords.

"Yeah, fine. Luna said you were looking for me. About tonight, right?"  
   
Ron nods sheepishly.

"Don't worry, I remembered!" Harry lies.

"I know, I know. Just wanted to make sure. You have been distracted lately...."

He looks as if he's going to continue, sees something in Harry's expression and then thinks better of it.

"Anyway. Have you plotted the constellations for Sinistra?"

"Yeah. Well, I tried at least. I have no clue whether it's correct though. I think my calculations looked a little out of range."

Ron grimaces. "Who cares. At least you've actually done something. I'm still stuck researching Orion and his bloody hat."

"...belt." Harry corrects, and tries desparately to quash the side of his mouth before he can break into a grin.

Ron gives a moan and collapses back onto his bed.

"Right I'm gonna go take a quick shower before we leave." Harry says to a prostrate Ron.

"Mowkay" He gives a vague mumble into his pillow.

-

When Harry returns holding his nightclothes, Ron's still sat on his bed eating a chocolate frog. He smiles up at him.

"Looking forward to it?"

"Not hardly," Harry replies.

"Me fucking neither. I hate this bloody weather."

"Weather? I think I'm more worried about parading round the school in my pyjamas. I can understand the first years doing something like this, but I'm a fully grown man. It's a little undignified. I think I'd like a bit more privacy."

"Think Sinistra just wants a look at your arse?"

"Argh. Ron, no! Please stop." He says, still holding his canon's tshirt to his chest . He drops it in favour of hurling a pillow at him when he won't stop laughing.

"Okay, okay... How abou-"

The smiles slips off of his face. At first, Harry's confused. Then he realises...

Fuck. Fuck.

He'd forgotten. How could he forget?

Of course. Because he'd been too distracted with Malfoy and Luna. He hadn't even thought to cover them. To disappear, dress privately, lest they see. How it must look.  
Now that he looked down, actually comprehended, what Ron must now be seeing.

His chest was a mess. There was no fooling Ron. He knew Harry's battle scars, and they did not look like the self inflicted marks, carefully ruled measurements that sat there now.

His arm too, where he'd sat and punched at the glass that night. He hadn't thought to vanish the jagged scar than ran from wrist to elbow. Perhaps he hadn't wanted to. Or rather, he felt that he didn't deserve to. After all the permanence, the magical scar that he'd left on Malfoy, had not faded so quickly either. Neither had the screams of those he loved. Death was the most permanent of all.  
Harry had reasoned that he deserved a few scars, at least. Deserved a lot more than that, in fact.

He'd expected Ron to yell. To question him. Demand that he explain himself.

He hadn't expected him to charge at him, and fold him into a hug. So strange was it in fact, that Harry had frozen. He'd thought Ron was about to attack him.

They didn't usually hug. On occasion, when they had defeated Voldemort; or when he'd nearly watched him asphyxiate in Slughorn's office, they had. This time however, Ron was holding him like he'd disappear in his arms. Harry felt a familiar lump in his throat at the touch. He supposed it was nice, if a little uncomfortable. He felt extremely awkward.

He heard Luna's words in his head and for the first time in a while, he allowed himself to relax.

When Ron losened his grip around him however, Harry felt a chill of fear spread down his spine. He knew. He'd take one look at Ron's face, saturated with pity and it would happen.

An icy cold bitterness insinuated its way down to his stomach. He knew what he would see there in Ron's face; action. A fierce determination, it was the way he'd looked as he'd pulled Harry out of the freezing lake and brought him back to land. Where once it'd brough relief, now it terrified him. He could almost feel it boring into him where his chin was pressed into Harry's shoulder.

A madness seemed to take over him. The voices growing to a crescendo. Yelling now; louder than ever. Ron would frog march him down to McGonagall's office and he'd be sent straight to a Mind Healer. He'd have to leave Hogwarts. He needed to stay here. He needed walk the grounds. Pad down the halls at night. It was the only place he felt at home. He just couldn't manage it. To be without his friends he loved so much. He even needed to see Malfoy; he wanted to hear him play that same song he played last night with the same lilting notes. Needed to watch the raindrops slide down the tower windows. He needed that didn't he? It was what was best for him. He was better alone. It was preferable to feeling this shame lick at him, hot and strong like flames.

If anyone asked him how it happened, he couldn't have replied. It felt like his brain was stuffed with cotton wool. The voices were yelling so viciously, Harry was almost blinded by it. It felt like static on the Dursley's old muggle TV. His hand twitched where his wand lay limply in it. Ron was still holding him. He said nothing, and Harry knew he was thinking deeply. Silently, Harry was screaming at him to let go, because each moment he held him felt like choking on glass; it was fear through and through, but he couldn't get the words out because part of him craved the safety. The candle by the entrance to the dormitory was starting to distort now, and Neville's plant pot was shaking.

Harry knew he had to do it. They whispered it to him. He knew the spell perfectly now. He wouldn't fail. One spell and he can stop this. He can stop all of this. The pain in his heart, in his head would cease. Harry had though he was good at resisting evil thoughts, but he was so tired and so broken that these ones were begining to make sense. His hand shook and he knew Ron was going to let go of him soon.  
'It would be so easy,' they told him.  
He gripped his wand more tightly.

Raised it.

Lowered it. Raised it once more.

He trembled. The wand level with Ron's head.

His arms were still around him. The window behind him was starting to rattle and Harry was certain it wasn't the wind. He thought of the consequences. They were too horrible to comprehend and Harry's brain was so muddled. There were so many voices that his own couldn't squeak through.

Ron's arms slackened as he whispered,

"Obliviate!"

He concentrated on the memory and wrenched it away. It thrummed and popped dully like a universe imploding out of existence. A whole line of would be's and should be's, destroyed.

Ron's head had now fallen limply, onto Harry's shoulder and he was holding him upright. He felt dead and doll-like. The voices hushed to a cruel silence, satisfied; but it was little comfort, Harry's own began to grow into its revulsion.

Harry felt something within him die.

He'd always known he was his own worst enemy. He'd never thought he'd be Ron's. Still, it's probably not even in the top ten of worst things he's done in his life. He hates himself.

Harry heaves him onto his bed with shaking hands. He dresses himself and waits for Ron to come to. In the silence Harry notices there's a crack in Neville's plant pot. The Dursley's were right when they called him destructive. Even though he'd just showered he feels disgusting. He'd violated his friend's free will.

When Ron woke, Harry had mumbled that he'd meet him at the tower and rushed out of the room.

When he yells after him to ask if he's completed the homework for Sinistra. Harry ignores him and tries to pretend it's the first time he's heard him say it.


	5. Aquila

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Talking had been painful and confusing for the both of them, but maybe they can sit together. Maybe they can listen instead.
> 
> He splays fingers across the keys. It's like slotting in the final piece of a jigsaw; so right and it's so wrong for someone like Draco Malfoy and it's the exact kind of comfort he needs in the moment. The same kind of comfort he'd imagine had resided in Potter as he'd punched through the window that night. The breaking through, the rebellion sweet on his tongue. There's no relief that can be more instant than surprising even yourself. He'll break his own boundaries, his own rules, because he knows that deep down they never belonged to him anyway.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey everyone! I'm (finally) back with the next chapter of LTD! So sorry for the delay, things have been pretty busy for me, and the first draft of this chapter just didn't really feel good enough to post. Just a small warning to remember to heed the warnings on this chapt, as it does contain ref and desc of self harm. Please take care, loves!  
> A huge thank you to unicornsandphoenix for the amazing beta, and wonderful advice, it's greatly appreciated!!<3 
> 
> Thank you for all the wonderful comments so far, they really motivate me and you're all awesome! :D 
> 
> Enjoy!

Draco sighs, fastening the belt of his dressing gown with shaking fingers. He stops. Takes a breath, then walks monotonously towards his bedsheets, and rolls them up. He casts a stasis and grabs his satchel. He did do the homework, right? He’s sure he did.

The thought is there pulsating in the back of his head, but he can't reach it. He cannot reach it beyond the way he's shaking with each passing moment, and the fact that he cannot seem to stand up properly. Draco's never been in shock before, but his thinks this is probably what it feels like.

Harry Potter.

It is all his mind screams at him. Paralysed with indecision, and feeling dirty; each guilty breath feels like heavy mud caked to his lungs. He rotates on the spot, and some vague part of him thinks that yes, that's all that he needs for tonight, and he should probably get going, because he's late now.

He's been like this all day. Ever since he'd found it, the crumpled thing which he nearly tore out shock. Out of the realisation that there was no Potter come to jump out at him anymore. There was no joke. There was not even an evil curse. Some scapegoat witch or wizard with dark intentions. There was no way to make this easy. There was nothing but Potter himself. And yet there was very little of Potter left at all.

If Draco had been troubled before, nothing could compare to this.

His back is still aching from where he'd sat and played piano last night. He'd played until he felt like a rag doll, boneless and weak. Yet now his blood is boiling in veins with a certain kind of fury, an anger with no discernable target, borne into him like a wave crashing, the force of it deafening.

For what is he to do now? What is he to think? What can he even say? If he is, indeed, meant to say anything at all?

Perhaps he'd been prepared to eventually march down to McGonagall with tales of Potter's mysterious cursing. Had been prepared even to take the fall when questions were raised as to why Draco himself was skulking about in classrooms after hours.

He would have done it. For Potter, and for the part of himself that owes him everything. He had known he couldn't just ignore this.

Until now. How is he to save Potter when he has to save him from himself? But he has to do something, doesn't he?

He's climbing the steps to the Tower now, taking them two at a time. Snatches of moonlight are shining through the many windows as he runs, and he reflects that it's a good night for them to study the stars. The route is second nature by now and he sighs a quiet breath of relief into the cool midnight air that he'll likely be one of the first to arrive, and not the last. He can't afford to get in trouble now. He's on thin ice as it is.

He thinks that perhaps he should write to Andromeda about this, but then feels a rush of guilt. He knows distinctly how he'd feel if someone had gone sharing his private thoughts with others. Especially with someone he knows. Maybe he'll do it anonymously then. Yes. He needs some perspective right about now, and Andromeda has always been a grounding presence in his life when he'd been broken after the war. She had steadily sewn him back together when it feel like he would burst from the enormity of what he'd done; the choices he'd made, bursting out of him like stuffing from a doll. He owed her a lot. And Potter just the same.

Even if most of the time he wasn't sure how to feel about him.

As he reaches the top of the Tower, Draco runs to pull open the door, relieved that he'll be on time. However, he's barrelled over by none other than Potter, who looks like he's seen a ghost.

Potter stares down blankly at Draco sprawled on the floor and then his eyes seem to focus back in on reality.

"Shit. Malfoy. Sorry." He doesn't insult Draco by offering a hand.

Draco dusts himself off and swallows.

"You're early." He says.

"What... Oh. Yeah," Potter's staring very hard at his scuffed up trainers.

It's so awkward that Draco thinks he should head inside, until he hears footsteps clamouring up the stairs, and of course this had to happen to him now.

Suddenly Potter's face seems to drain of all colour and he sways slightly, reaching out a hand against the stone wall. Draco hears Weasley and Granger then, and he moves to turn inside until he feels a tug on jumper, and sees Potter clinging to it, eyes as wide and terrified as he'd looked on the night when this had all began. The trapped look upon Potter's face scares him, if only because of how out of character it is. Just like the letter. The letter with Draco's name all over it.

Now it's coming back to him, and Draco's finding it hard to breathe under the weight of understanding. Potter's normally dark complexion is so pale, like the faded words that he'd spoken through the pages. Draco looks down at Potter's hand and sees the pinprick marks of glass, like miniature prisms, even though they are not there at all, not anymore and Draco just the same, doesn't know what he wants from Potter, but he knows at least what he needs to do.

He's wheezing slightly, short stuttering breaths, and when he steadies himself the only sound that can escape is

"Work with me, tonight?"

It's the second time that Draco has spoken before he'd known what he was going to say. As if the words had been ripped from his throat, as he lay exposed and vulnerable. Once again he cannot say even, that the feeling is entirely voluntary. If it is, it's buried very deep within him.

Potter nods once, and pushes them both into the classroom before the voices can reach the top of the stairs.

                                                                                                                            _

Draco's not entirely sure what's conspired, but he enters the classroom just the same. Potter a few steps behind.

He eyes the piano in the corner with longing, and his fingers twitch, jittery and in need of an outlet. Nevertheless, he walks to a corner in the edge of the room, settling down into his beanbag, and unpacking his bedding.

He's glad for the extra blanket he brought, when he sighs a breath and watches it disappate into the air. It's still raining outside, drumming against the ceiling in fat droplets, and making Draco drowsy despite the adrenaline that still rushes through his veins.

Potter plops down next to him in his yellow Cannon's t-shirt. It looks worn and billowy against Potter's wiry form. He's lost a lot of weight recently, Draco notes with a tinge of unease. He decides not to mention it.

They watch as the room fills slowly. People trickle in, yawning and clutching armfuls of their heavy blankets. Draco's eyelids are drooping now and it's only eleven at night. He suspects the news he's just received has had something to do with that. Right now he'd like nothing more that to collapse onto his bed and forget the world.

Instead, here he is, an arm's length from Potter himself, with his head hurting terribly from the stress of it all.

He watches as Longbottom and Lovegood enter the room carrying yet another potted plant monstrosity. Draco notes with muted horror that Longbottom seems to be gluing the pot back together with his wand as they walk. Draco hopes it's not a miniature Whomping Willow. Lovegood smiles benignly in his general direction, and he starts, until he realises that it's probably directed at Potter, who's sat staring at the door with something akin to dread. He wonders where Weasley and Granger have got to. They seemed to be right behind them on the stairs. Potter seems to be wondering the same thing from the way he's worrying his bottom lip.

When Granger enters alone, Draco frowns, but ultimately looks away. It's not like he's waiting for them. Or for anyone. Not after the war at least. Usually he sits alone.

Except for now. Now he's next to Potter. Potter, who looks so different. So cold in his thin pyjamas that he's shivering. He looks startlingly young and almost helpless, or maybe Draco's just seeing it for the first time. He wonders what he's doing with all of this. How can he save the boy who saved the world? 

Draco hasn't any form of an answer other than to reach over and subtly drop the corner of his blanket onto Potter's knee. He's not quite sure what to think, but there's no use letting Potter die of hypothermia in the interim.

Draco averts his gaze from Potter's face. He tries not to feel pleased as Potter takes the blanket in all it's Slytherin green glory, and wraps it around himself tentatively, wincing, from the cold air that must have chilled deep into his bones.

                                                                                                                            -

"Good evening, everyone!"

Sinistra enters the room in a mist of black smoke. Her loud booming voice seems to perk everyone up a little.

To Draco's amusement, Longbottom actually jumps, swearing softly under his breath as he nearly drops his newly mended plant pot.

Sinistra ignores him pointedly. He supposes she's not about to chastise a war hero. Still, Draco's inclined to think she has a soft spot for him, if the smile that tugs at the side of her mouth is anything to go on.

She waves a dark bangled hand. "Thank you all for coming. I know, I know. You have to, but well... it's a cold night! I appreciate your dedication to your studies. This will be the first night time lesson of many, depending on how far we get each session."

She points to the board in the centre of the room.

"Tonight we are going to be familiarising ourselves with the sky at night, and if all goes well we will also be determining our zodiac signs, and their magical implications. Firstly, however, I will be requiring your essays."

She waves her wand, and Draco watches in relief as his homework zooms out of his bag and into the pile on table with the rest.

Sinistra nods in satisfaction, and Draco grabs his quill and parchment, and begins to take notes.

                                                                                                                           -

After an hour, Draco's mind is starting to wander over to Potter, and he sighs in relief as Sinistra ends her discussion on Apollo.

"Okay. For the second half of the lesson you will be working with the person next to you. I would like you to please discover your own zodiac sign, and list some of the magical attributes typically associated with it. Based on the date of your birth, it is a common muggle practice to infer the type of person you are based on planetary position at the time. These types are called zodiac signs, or if you prefer, star signs."

She points upwards to the rich blue sky.

"Whilst some of what is allegedly 'predicted' by this method is messy and can be misleading, it is in fact true that your respective star signs can have some bearing over the type of magic that you can perform best. Typically, a Scorpio, such as myself, will perform strong hexes and my position as a water sign will mean that I can conjure water based spells with a stronger force than an air, earth or fire sign would usually be able to."

At this, the atmosphere in the room changes dramatically, and Sinistra smiles and lifts up a hand at the excited whispers that have broken out across the room.

"That's all I'm giving you for now. Your copy of Searching Your Sign will assist you in this task, and I will be coming around to speak with some of you, so please do not hesitate to ask me for guidance. You can begin now".

Draco turns to Potter.

"...Do you want to go first?"

Potter shakes his head. He turns towards Draco properly, breaking away from Granger's questioning gaze.

"You go."

Draco squints down at the textbook. "Okay, so. I'm a...hm,"

"-Gemini. You're a Gemini."

"How did you know?"

Potter quirks a smile, but it looks weak and sickly. He scratches an arm idly, "Muggle upbringing, remember. You're birthday is the fifth of June,"

"Oh. Yeah."

Draco flips to the page that reads Gemini in the textbook. He skims a finger down the page, and then passes it to Potter who reads aloud.

"So...especially good at duplicative magic, Gemino curse and all that. Also gifted with transformative spells such as Glamours, blah blah... Ah! You're an air sign, so a strong command over the immaterial...'air signs can usually produce a very powerful patron-

He breaks off as Draco flinches, thought it's not for the reason he thinks. Potter must think him insecure. He's sure he's heard the story about his inability to cast a patronus, as false as it may be.

Draco had felt it, even if nobody else could. Luckily none of his classmates had seen death as it walked towards him. The image blurred at the edges of his vision but he'd known it as plain as the nose on his face. He'd known her. His patronus; even if she had not revealed her corporeal form until a few nights ago. As soon as he called to her, he'd known instintually. 

He's not sure if it's better or worse that they all think him incompetent. He supposes it's better than being thought a freak, as one inevitably would if they knew the truth. Draco's not sure if he knows anyone else with the literal embodiment of death as a reflection of their happiest memories.

"Er. Sorry," Potter says, and Draco shrugs it off, because really, it's all he can do.

They say little else in the silence that follows. The room is alive with chatter, but Draco doesn't really feel like saying very much. It's uncomfortable now and he's still processing the events of the day. Potter it seems, feels the same.

He's sat drumming his pencil on the textbook, looking lightly troubled, as if there's a particularly trying sentence he's reading.

Draco would have almost fallen for it, if it hadn't been for the way his fingers shook, the pencil fumbled in his grasp.

He thinks he needs to say something, but he's not sure what. He has no bloody idea what Potter's star sign is.

Surprisingly, it's Potter who breaks the silence.

"You hum when you're nervous." It's said quite plainly, without malice.

"Oh. Bad habit," He reddens; no one had noticed that before.

"No, no. I don't mind it. It's so loud in here anyway, I doubt it makes a difference," Potter smiles at him a little, and Draco's heart beats a little faster. For a second it's so hard to reconcile this image with the Potter who had raised his own wand to his temple a few nights ago.

Then Draco notices it. Potter's looking just slightly to the left of him. Almost like he's talking to someone behind him; and Draco wants to turn around, but he thinks maybe that would be indiscreet. Regardless he knows; can feel the cold stone wall behind him, revealing nothing and no one.

The realisation is awful in its implication. Now he's thinking on it, he doesn't think Potter has actually looked him in the eye since before the war. The thought is weirdly chilling, like the point of a knife, and it makes Draco laugh a little in slight hysteria.

He rapidly attempts to come up with something he can say, but once again Potter steals his words from him.

"What song is it? That you're humming. I like it,"

"Oh? Er. Moonlight Sonata. It's muggle,"

Potter follows Draco's eyes to the piano in the centre of the room.

"Do you play?"

"Yes. Sometimes. It helps me relax." Draco shrugs, he's surprised at his observation skills.

Potter seems to be considering this. His eyes still fixed on the point next to Draco, before they drop to his hands encased in Draco's blanket.

Draco wants to say that Potter should listen to him play. He wants to say that he composes too. Wants to say that it's the only thing he loves anymore. He presses his fingers to the keys and forgets the way he'd trembled; pale and shaking in the middle of a battlefield.

He says nothing.

Not even piano can be his safe haven now. After all it's exactly what he was doing on the night he saved Potter. He shouldn't implicate himself by drawing attention to it. Potter it seems, looks torn between questioning further, and moving on. Evidently he drops the subject, as he asks,

"What's my sign, then?"

                                                                                                                    _

In retrospect, Draco unsurprised when he discovers Potter's a Leo.

"So. Leo. You're a... fire sign. Defence and attack skills are a natural inclination. Well... that makes sense. Fire signs are also efficient when it comes to well, conjuring fire er, and they're also good at protecting against it, see proficiency at ...Aguamenti and... Smoke protection spells-" He trails off.

Fuck. No. He won't think about that now. It's done. They're fine.

"So...yes, Potter. There you go." He coughs through the smoke he knows no longer pools in his lungs. He tries to crack a smile, but he knows his eyes are wet and stinging from fumes that aren't really there.

Potter nods jerkily and stares down at his hands once more. He's picking at a thread on his t-shirt, and he's also framed in a blaze of gold now, beautiful, shiny and covered with dirt. Disgustingly heroic.

Shit. Draco should never have suggested this. He should've known they could never handle-

"Play something for me. On the piano. After we're done. Play something to help me forget, like you." Potter still won't meet his gaze, but his words carry with a ferocity that surprises Draco, bold against his shaking fingers.

"Okay. Yes," he coughs again, licks at dry lips, and the flames that have started to eat away at Potter's frame steadily disippate.

Draco thinks he should be surprised at Potter's blatant show of vulnerability, but all he feels is a relief that carries down into his fingers, and he itches to pour himself into the music.

He turns away as Sinistra calls their attention once more.

                                                                                                                          -

It's pitch black now, where they're sat. Him and Harry. Draco Malfoy and Harry Potter. It feels just about as strange as it should.

Everyone has left, bar the stars that the frame the sky above. The same stars which watched over them a few nights ago.

Draco sits down in the familiar seat nervously. He's a little self conscious now that Potter's sat here watching-but-not-quite-watching him. His green eyes skate Draco's edges, as if direct sight would be too much exposure.

There is a crisp breeze blowing against the curtains by the windowsill, and the dust in the air sparkles under the light of the moon.

Draco remembers now that they hadn't spoken a word to each other since they had watched the others go. Both pretending to pack their things away at a snails pace, and with one hand to wave away Granger's questioning gaze at the door. Now here they are together but still distant, and Draco's acutely aware of just how nervously they are dancing around one another.

Talking had been painful and confusing for the both of them, but maybe they can sit together. Maybe they can listen instead.

He splays fingers across the keys. It's like slotting in the final piece of a jigsaw; so right and it's so wrong for someone like Draco Malfoy and it's the exact kind of comfort he needs in the moment. The same kind of comfort he'd imagine had resided in Potter as he'd punched through the window that night. The breaking through, the rebellion sweet on his tongue. There's no relief that can be more instant than surprising even yourself. He'll break his own boundaries, his own rules, because he knows that deep down they never belonged to him anyway.

Potter's eyes snap to his fingers as he settles into a tune. He doesn't know what to say so he plays instead and hopes Potter can feel him in the notes. He's chosen Chopin tonight. Nocturne Op.9, No.2. Draco had always found muggles and their strange names for classical songs to be amusing, and he'd shortened the song in his head simply to a feeling. This particular melody reminds him of the first time he'd snuck up here to play. He'd sharply copied down the notes onto his parchment, and had played to that same effect. Nervously. Always a finger aloft, hovering over a note, a little lost and a little overwhelmed, but soothed nonetheless. Often he'd hit the wrong notes and his shame would ring out, hollow and bold in the large room. It was liberating, to not have to be the best. To not be afraid to fuck up for once. He had nothing left to lose anymore.

He moves into a faster tune, now. This one is his own. One he had been penning out in the library, in small snatches of time when he could relax. It's a little experimental, and he's a little nervous, but there's something about Potter that makes him want to bear all. To be open, honest and all the things he's never been before. He can feel the grounding weight of Potter behind him, and the near press of one cold arm as the crook of his elbow reaches it every so often when he plays the high notes. It's a comfort, and it reminds him that he's playing for Harry Potter.

Potter's standing beside him now, placid and still, but Draco can sense that he's listening to every single note. His attentiveness makes something burn within Draco, and he feels the compulsion, the idiotic temptation, to play the same song he'd been playing that night. The same night when he'd nearly watched Harry Potter kill himself in front of him.

That had also been one of his own. A much more gritty tune that he'd written when he was pissed at the way his life had turned out. Only nineteen and the book closed on him. He'd thrashed himself against the keys, dizzy and broken, choking on his own tears. He'd not thought about Harry Potter then, he'd been so consumed within himself that he'd been careless. Perhaps he'd paid for his carelessness. He knows it was worth it. Truthfully he couldn't imagine a world without Harry Potter in it.

The jovial tune he'd been playing ends on a dud note. There's no real way to transition into a song such as the one he's going to play now.

He places a gentle hand over the notes. He takes a breath. He needs to do this. Maybe he shouldn't but it's almost an exorcism of the pain. It feels right somehow. The first note caves under the press of a finger, and he-

"Thank you...you. You play well-" Potter mumbles from behind him suddenly, though Draco's not sure what he's thanking him for.

There's something strange in his voice, something solid and permanent. Like he has to fight to get the words out, and it makes Draco look up at him.

His heart leaps in his throat. For the first since the War, Potter's staring right at him.

Almost as if he were memorising every line embedded within it. Scrutinising the exact shape and form of his jaw, his mouth. It doesn't feel as comforting it as should, in fact it's almost unnatural the way he's staring.

It's almost worse.

Potter's mouth twists, like he has an itch he can't scratch, and Draco think he's gritting his teeth. Now it's almost like he's staring through Draco instead.

"I...I need to go," He mumbles vaguely to himself more than Draco.

"Er okay," Draco tries to smile at him, but his mouth doesn't seem to be cooperating, and he's about to ask Potter if he wants to sit down somewhere when the expression lifts from his face.

That's the only warning Draco has before Harry Potter falls to the floor in front of him.

 

                                                                                                                                -

 

Shit.

He scrambles up from the stool and falls to the floor, nearly tripping over in the scuffle.

Now he's looking he can see Potter's bloodless face, and the way his chest stutters with each gulp of air.

He thinks, just for a second, if Potter actually has been cursed, but the thought dies immediately as he's concieved it when Draco casts a stasis.

He goes to touch Potter's bare arm and he notices that it's wet with something.

What?

He lifts his arm slowly. The movement causes the glamour that Potter must have cast to shift, and fall away into nothing.

Draco nearly screams at the sight of Potter's bleeding arms. The damage is awful, and the poorly cast stitching spells have broken open where he'd fallen. Now there's blood poolling over the both of them and his own Sectumsempra scars hurt in some phantom form of sympathy.

Except he hadn't been the one to cause this.

He's on his knees now, clutching Potter boneless and weak against him. His head flops down onto his chest when Draco goes to lift him up. Oh god. He can't handle this, he really can't. Fuck.

Potter's so heavy against him, and it's like keeping a stone above water, he just can't manage and the fucking stars stare down at him with impassivity and he wants to punch through the glass at them himself for leaving him to deal with this.

There's a taste of this same anger on his tongue when he looks at Potter.

He looks almost like an angel from this position, and it cuts a part of him deeply, because this is exactly how he'd looked. How he'd felt, when Potter had cursed him. Painful, guilty, breathless relief.

Suddenly he's furious. He's so angry at how they'd all had to suffer for a fight that was never theirs. He's angry at his father, and how he'd forced him into a mould that just wouldn't fit. He's angry for Potter, and he's angry how he's all alone. Potter's still all alone. He's become the single most famous wizard in the world, and he's still so fucking alone with his own thoughts that he's resorted to this.

Draco can barely think beyond the terror that grips him and he's steadily losing his nerve. Because he knows how it feels. To look like Potter right now.

He knows what it's like to lie on the broken ground while everything falls apart around him. He knows what it's like to be trapped within himself. His own little haze of pain, but also a strange detachment. He knows purely because how Potter had made a mess of him. How he'd drawn red marked lines, hisses of violence against his skin. So casually picked him apart, and ruined him forever.

He'd taken his one pride. His body, the only thing he'd had left. His mind has abandoned him long ago. He'd taken the only thing he had left to value and smashed it without more than a second glance.

He remembers how callous he'd thought Potter. How vicious he still thought him.

For enemies. He'd seen him as that. Nothing more. Draco had clung to him like confused child. He hated himself all through the weight that lifted off of his shoulders. He hated Potter more.

He wonders if he's changed his mind. He wonders if he's sympathetic because he'd never thought Potter capable of remorse, or pain before. He wonders if he forgives him for it all, or even just some of it.

He wonders if he should. There's a small part of him that wants to let him lie there and bleed all over them both, all down the stairs until they both drown under the burden of it. A small, broken child that's bitter and hurt, still crying inside of him.

Then he remembers the albatross around his own neck. The horrible, horrible things he's done. He remembers how Potter had saved him, had risked his life and the world for three foolish boys. He remembers how he'd felt the warm weight of Potter's arms around him in the fire, so full of heat and life. So unlike the coldness of the moment.

And still he's alive. Against all odds. They're all only here because of Potter, and Potter alone, and Draco had heard the stories, had heard of how he'd died for it.

He'd come back, and now he was trying to leave again and Draco wasn't going to let any of it happen. He'd owed so much, and through his resentment and his fear, he steadies himself.

He knows that if he leaves for the Hospital Wing he'll be too late. Potter's bleeding out in front of him and his skin is like ice.

He thinks maybe he should just risk it but he just can't bear to force his arms away from Potter; almost like he doesn't trust anyone else with him.

In a way, there's some truth to it and, Draco thinks that yes, he can do this, purely _because_ of how Potter had cursed him all those years ago. Purely because he'd watched helpless and in agony, in much the same position.

He'd told himself he'd never bleed out like that again.

And now he's the only who can save Potter from the same.

Draco takes a deep breath.

He knows what he has to do.

 

 

 

                                                                                                                            -

When Harry stirs, he's in the Hospital Wing. 

He's confused and his body is numb with exhaustion. It's pitch black and he just can't grasp his glasses in the darkness.

Frustrated, he lies back against his pillow with a groan.

There's a blue mist in the air and the black ceiling above him seems to dance with a million stars all dotted in curious shapes.

He tries to reach out a finger to join them up, but they morph into freckles on pale skin, and the soft press of ink into parchment. They become ink spots and little musical notes and suddenly he's hearing a gentle melody whispered against his cheek like a lullaby.

Now he's seeing nothing again and his arms ache even though he feels nothing there to suggest injury.

He thinks he should find that strange but his head is starting to pound from thinking, and so he closes his eyes once more.

There's someone sitting by the bed opposite, and Harry sees a thestral walking towards them, but he loses it in the darkness. He must be seeing things again.

 

Harry closes his eyes and goes back to sleep.

                                                                                                                            -

 

Dear Andromeda,

I hope you are well. I desperately need your advice... It's about...

I....  
Fuck.

                                     

                                                                                                                            -

 

Dear Harry.

 

Oh Potter, how can I begin?

  
I'm quite lost, you see. Not entirely sure where I should start. How I can begin to rummage through the rubble, the broken ribs, the fragments of you. They stick to my skin. I'm trapped Potter. Look at you, you're almost paper thin now. A mess of chalky decay, stardust scattered against me. You're so broken, and I'm so lonely. Perhaps that is what's making me think I can do this.

Everything was fine. Or at least we could pretend it was couldn't we? Last night, or suppose today, if you're being pedantic. Tentative, gentle steps towards something, but we were getting there. I've never played piano for anyone aside from Andromeda before. It was the happiest I'd been in years.

Now I'm here in the Hospital Wing. Watching you, and wondering how I can verbalise any of this without looking insane. Maybe some things are better left unsaid.

I _tried_ to sleep, you know. My dreams are no friend at the best of times Potter, but now you're dying in them. It's been a week, Potter and you're already dying in them. I'm not a seer, but if you've tried it twice now, you'll try again.

Even if you didn't mean it this time. I think you probably did, deep down, because I can see you when I close my eyes.

You're floating away from me, crushed into the snow. You're in the damned stars, staring down at me. Your eyes, that same algae green, bright, and the colour of twisting seas, rich foam and salt over my cheeks. The salt on my own tongue when I woke with your name written all over it. Screaming for you.

Potter I read your letter again. It's crumpled beyond belief. I got blood on it as well. 

I've washed my hands five times now, but it's still lingering. Or maybe it's just ink. It's hard to tell the difference now. I'm all shaken up.

I'm sorry that I thought you conceited and arrogant. So tough, and so perfect that I never thought I'd see you broken down. I'm sorry, and I'm angry as well, because you've fooled us all, haven't you?

I never thought you could act. Too Gryffindor to hide your emotions, that's what I honestly believed. It's rather telling that I thought you'd been cursed. I never imagined. Never would have believed...

I'm sorry. I'm sorry for us all. Please don't think they never cared, Potter. Never that.

It's bitingly ironic, you see. I was never able to hide my emotions like you. I know you saw peace in my eyes when you nearly offed me in sixth year. I was never very good at hiding. You always saw through me. I owe you the same. Maybe I'm deluded...

You always did cloud my judgement.

Now you're making me think I could attempt to fix this. How I can attempt to glue you together. I'm so unqualified, it's almost impossible to grasp the reality of just what I'm attempting. It keeps slipping through my fingers, like it's air. Like you're not there at all. This isn't real, and I'll wake up tomorrow to find you, several pounds heavier, rosy cheeked and beautiful. So beautiful and alive.

Yes, I admit that. Truly, what does it matter anymore, the meaningless truth. It is what it is. What does it matter to lose some face, when the world's a hairsbreadth away from losing you. You. You. You.

Potter I can't believe it. I can't believe you. I'm a second away from tears. So so angry that you dared to shatter the glass on us. I was so happy living in our little illusion, our shared delusions. I was made from paper. I was born from it. So two dimensional. A typical bully, and you the glowing hero I loved to tease. I was jealous, and we all knew it. It was brilliant. Potter I loved the lies we made together. I miss our fights. I miss you.

I think I've figured it out you know. Why I'm so obsessed with that moment when we really fought. When you saw me cry. Cut me open. The mirror came crashing to the floor. The curtain closed, and revealed to the both of us that I bleed just the same as you do. Feel just the same as you do. Perhaps I felt even more, then. It is an unbearable truth that's haunted me. Has haunted us both, don't forget, because I know you know it too. I've read your letter remember, you nearly died in front of me tonight Potter, and maybe that's the final straw. Oh Potter. How can any of this be true?

At least I'm not an idiot. I'm not a mind healer. I know it's not as simple as Longbottom's blasted plant pot. How I wish I could knit you together all the same. You know, they had to knit me together too. After I bled you out of my veins. All over the floor in that fucking bathroom. They patched me up, and sent me along. That's how I knew what to do. Then they sent me back into the arms of death once again. I don't think I'll ever forgive them for not saving my soul when they had the chance. I'm sorry Harry. I'm going off once again. Those were my choices, and I live with them. I live in them. I live in my own skin. I can't escape myself. That's what Andromeda keeps telling me, anyway.

Well maybe I want to be like her, Harry.  She introduced me to piano, actually. She also taught me to pay it forward. That's what I'm doing here. There may indeed be more to it, Harry Potter, but we'll ignore that for now. There's always been something about you, is it any surprise that I'm sat here writing this?

What I really mean is this. This is my promise to you, in writing and all. I want to help you. I'm going to help. Somehow. Forgive me if I don't know what I'm doing, but on balance, I think, truly, it's better than doing nothing at all.

You know why of course. Or maybe you don't. Perhaps that's our issue. I've always assumed Potter. I've never asked you. Never said a word. So I'm telling you now, if indeed you do not know. Even if I'm speaking into nothing. Even if I never send you this. Just know this.

You're worth it. So so worth everything, and more. Worth a million of me, that's for sure. This is so wrong and I'm so outraged that you feel this way. That you hid this way. You did everything right, Harry Potter. You were a flame. Truly so golden and you shone so brightly until the end. You were my hope. My two dimensional knight in shining armour.

If anyone could've saved us then it was you, and you did. You fucking did.

Me? I'm a beggar, Potter. I take what I can get. I'm lucky for it all, and I crush the part of myself that complains. I crush it into the dirt until it can't breathe.

It's me who should suffer now. Me, who should come along and lift this weight from your shoulders. You've carried it for so long.

It's making me feel bad, Potter. My selfishness. That I should lack the conscience you do. The guilt that you do. Even if there's something wrong with you. Even if it's not healthy. Even though you would have died tonight, I hate that even now you're showing me up. And maybe that's selfish, and insensitive and it's a private thought, but it's true.

There will always be envy between us, don't you think?

Like it or not, it's how I've survived. Slytherin you see. Not selfish, but I protect myself. It's do or die, Potter. Sometimes you can give too much. I think you could learn from me in this. Give it a try will you? Better yet, I'll show you.

You need to do something for you for once. I'll teach you piano. Maybe we haven't had much luck with it so far. Two near death experiences, and all, but third time lucky, perhaps? I'll give something of myself back you. Merlin knows, you deserve it.

So yes. You're a bloody broken mess, and no one has even the decency to notice. I'm greedy, quiet; still cowardly. I'm probably the last person you'd want as a saviour, and I'm standing knee deep in the explosion. Like I said, it's do or die.

But, I think, sometimes you can also give too little. I owe you this. I need you here. We all need you Harry Potter.

A little bit of death never killed anyone.

Yours,

Draco Malfoy


End file.
